Staff Technical Program Manager

Staff Technical Program Manager - Generative AI, remote across ANZ Join to apply for the Staff Technical Program Manager - Generative AI, remote across ANZ role at Canva . Join the team redefining how the world experiences design. Where and How You Can Work Our flagship campus is in Sydney. We also have a campus in Melbourne and co‑working spaces in Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide. You have choice in where and how you work; we trust our Canvanauts to choose the balance that empowers them and their team to achieve their goals. What You’ll Be Doing in This Role Drive global AI research delivery: Lead planning and execution across Core’s major research programs, aligning distributed teams in Australia, Vienna, China, and San Francisco. Ensure clarity of scope, timelines, milestones, and quality expectations, and see these programs through from research planning to production readiness. Coordinate cross‑time‑zone research programs: Create the operational systems that keep global research work moving—scheduling collaboration windows, managing dependencies, unblocking researchers, and ensuring work progresses smoothly despite geographic distribution. Bridge research and product: Partner with Product, Engineering, and Go‑to‑Market teams to identify high‑quality research output suitable for productisation. Bring structure to evaluation, prioritisation, and handover processes so strong research becomes high‑impact product features. Ensure high‑quality research operations: Introduce program governance, consistent reporting, risk surfacing, and standardised ways of working across Core. Improve predictability, transparency, and delivery confidence across all research programs. Support AI model development: Help coordinate experiments, data needs, and model training cycles. Facilitate discussions on trade‑offs, sequencing, and technical decisions to help teams move quickly and responsibly. Build alignment and trust: Facilitate communication between researchers, product teams, leadership, and stakeholders. Bring clarity to complex discussions, align conflicting priorities, and maintain strong, transparent relationships across the organisation. Mentor and uplift others: Contribute to TPM craft across the group by sharing best practices, improving operational frameworks, and supporting TPMs and leaders working with AI‑driven teams. You’re probably a match if you have 5+ years of experience as a Technical Program Manager or equivalent role in a technology company. Strong technical aptitude, with familiarity in concepts related to ML, data pipelines, experimentation, and model development – text to image and video experience and familiarity is critical. Experience working with Product Managers, Engineers, and Researchers to deliver complex, multi‑team initiatives. Proven ability to manage large programs end‑to‑end across distributed teams and time zones. Strong strategic thinking, able to balance long‑term research goals with near‑term product needs. Comfortable navigating ambiguity, making sense of evolving research environments, and bringing structure to uncertain problem spaces. Excellent communication skills, capable of managing up, across, and outward with clarity and accountability. Skilled at resolving conflicting priorities, aligning teams, and establishing delivery confidence. Committed to uplifting craft, mentoring others, and building scalable delivery practices for a growing research organisation. Curious about AI and enthusiastic about using AI tools to improve program management, team efficiency, and decision‑making. About the Group / Team The CORE (Canva Original Research & Exploration) group was founded in 2025 to help Canva realise its full potential in empowering the world to design through advanced AI capabilities. CORE serves as Canva’s AI research backbone, bringing together a globally distributed team focused on pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in design intelligence. About the Role / Specialty At Canva, our ability to deliver world‑class AI capabilities depends on how well we coordinate, align, and operationalise the work of our rapidly expanding global research organisation. As a Staff Technical Program Manager in the CORE group, you’ll play a critical role in enabling this by driving clarity, consistency, and execution across some of Canva’s most complex and high‑impact AI research programs. What’s in it for you? Achieving our crazy big goals motivates us to work hard – and we do – but you’ll experience lots of moments of magic, connectivity and fun woven throughout life at Canva, too. We also offer a range of benefits to set you up for every success in and outside of work. Here’s a Taste Of What’s On Offer Equity packages – we want our success to be yours too. Inclusive parental leave policy that supports all parents & carers. An annual Vibe & Thrive allowance to support your wellbeing, social connection, office setup & more. Flexible leave options that empower you to be a force for good, take time to recharge and supports you personally. Check out lifeatcanva.com for more info. We celebrate all types of skills and backgrounds at Canva so even if you don’t feel like your skills quite match what’s listed above – we still want to hear from you Please note that interviews are conducted virtually. #J-18808-Ljbffr